Sure to become a cult classic, Mystery Team was written by and stars the folks from Derrick Comedy. Three friends who spent their childhood solving small-time mysteries are now seniors in high school and get their first big case – a murder. As a mystery movie, it was suprisingly intelligent and layered well. It’s the sort of mystery that’s been lacking in movies for some time and honestly reminiscent of Chinatown at times. As a comedy, it had plenty of LOL moments. I almost spit-taked my beer at one point. Totally quotable all the way through and they only stooped to a poop joke once. Actor D.C. Pierson (top picture – right) was in attendance at my screening and noted that “When you have fake shit on your hands, people treat you like you have real shit on your hands.” That made me laugh.

But I had one problem with Mystery Team that I couldn’t get past = the characters are man-boys. They are high school seniors acting like they’re in middle school. They don’t know what the word “pussy” means and say things like “gumballs!” instead of “fuck.” It’s the kind of character Will Ferrel played out over the years. It’s so irritating and made me not give a gumball about the characters. Pierson stated that the concept was to take G-rated characters and throw them into an R-rated world. I get that. But they were like cartoon versions of G-rated characters. Way too G.

The movie spoofs on old boy detective series like Encyclopedia Brown and The Hardy Boys, but The Venture Brothers covered that territory first and did it better. Man, I love Venture Brothers. It’s got such a deep mythos and it respects and trusts the intelligence of its audience. Mystery Team knew the territory well and pulled off a great mystery, then, you know…man-boys.

- Oh Mars